cassian had been afraid of the dark when he was a child. he remembers vividly left alone in the threadbare tent his mother had used while the men took her elsewhere. sometimes they didn’t bother. and she’d tell him to cover himself with his wings. to block everything out. he thought in those moments, when she’d brush finger tips to his cheek and promise him that it would be over soon if he’d just… close his eyes, that she loved him. he thought that less the day she’d taken him to the furthest away camp from where he was raised and left him. she didn’t touch his cheek. didn’t let her fingers drift through his curls. didn’t tell him that it would all be over soon. she simply, left.
he’d come a long way since then. he belonged now. he’d made his way in the world. and he’d made his family in his own way. and perhaps while none would call it entirely functional, it was better than anything he’d had before. cassian has lived decades, centuries - and dates and anniversaries evade him at the best of times. but somehow, he never quite forgets the day his mother left him in that camp. and the day, years later he’d gone back and found out she was dead.
two days past starfall. two days past the longest day of the year.
that night, he sits alone in the dark. that night he holds a bottle of wine in his hand and looks out over velaris. past the glittering city and to the mountains. to the starry skies above them. to the heavens that will never quite have a place for him the way they would the others. history will remember rhysand. history will remember the shadow singer. but for all the titles he earns, he is still the bastard son of the camp whore on this night, two nights past solstice.
feet kick gently back and forth as they hang over the ledge of the roof. he feels the tendril of shadows, that fuzzing of darkness in the corner of his vision before he hears azriel ( @knightsradiants ) approach silently, the wine bottle is lifted. shared. cassian is not oft prone to the self indulgence of misery. but tonight, tonight he might seek company in it.
‘ do you think —. ‘ his voice trails off, then a scoff, ‘ never mind. so. how were the human lands? ‘
